


Summertime

by mxami



Category: My Chemical Romance
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-12-31
Updated: 2018-01-21
Packaged: 2018-09-13 18:47:32
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 9,418
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9136897
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mxami/pseuds/mxami
Summary: One summer, teenager Frank Iero reluctantly uproots his bittersweet life in Jersey and flies overseas to live in a tiny French village with his mom. Speaking maybe three words of French, he expects it to be the driest summer of his life. But when one green-eyed local catches his attention, everything changes, and adventure ensues.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! The idea for this fic has been rolling around in my head since I visited Paris and other areas of the French countryside last summer, and I am very excited to write it for you. Please note that I DO NOT SPEAK FRENCH, I have only been to France three times on vacation, so if there are mistakes in the rare bits written in the language (don't worry the fic is completely in English), feel free to correct me. The story is from Frank's POV. Also please let me know if you'd like more of this story, I tend to write more when I can see that someone actually enjoys it and validates that it is not utter trash. Thank you, and enjoy!

Chapter One

 

I woke with a start as my head lolled sharply over my right shoulder, jolting me awake. After I scowled and furiously blinked the murky clouds from my eyes, I watched the dim light of the kindling new day creep through the finger-smudged windows of the train and I sighed. I had no knowledge of how long we’d been riding nor how long we had still ahead. All I knew was that the infallible plains surrounding the airport we had touched down in had, at some point, morphed into soft, rolling hills, dotted with the occasional crumbling cottage or babbling creek. My foggy brain somehow managed to fizz to life in time to make the assumption that this meant that we were, in fact, quickly nearing our destination.  
I was pissed. The relentless chittering of the rusted train not only chattered my teeth but also tested my patience. My sleep schedule was completely fucked on behalf of the erratic nature of events that dominated the past day and a half. This was mostly due to my inability to stand the stale air of overnight flights, the screeching babies, the hacking elderlies, and the condescending flight attendants. Not to mention the manic vibe that encompassed the Charles de Gaulle Airport, filled to the brim with a ceaseless buzz of tourism that my mom told me settles in the city every summer. Just standing in a winding line of weary travelers waiting to be permitted into one of the biggest cities in Europe, during the most crowded season…to say I’m exhausted would be an awful fucking understatement.  
Despite the rotten glare I gave the scarlet gleam of the rising sun, it ignored me and followed the normal cycle of the universe. Its rays spilled over the grassy hills, shining into my sleepy eyes, and irritating the hell out of me. Despite this, the second my surroundings shifted once again and more houses began to appear as the train dashed into the little city-village of Nénuphar, I was mesmerized by the way the sun’s rays awakened the 18th century buildings, slinked through its open shutters, and kissed each tiled rooftop with a soft morning glow.  
I might actually not hate living here.  
The train’s rusted wheels wheezed as we pulled into the shabby station and squeaked slowly to a stop. I jostled my mom dozing on the cracked velvet next to me and her soft snores shifted to confused mumbles as she sleepily rubbed her face. I watched her wake, and as her eyes scanned the halted train and the rising sun outside, an expression of old familiarity dawned on her tired features, and I saw the shadow of a smile play discreetly on her lips.  
I wrestled my earbuds back into my bag and heaved it onto my shoulder along with Mom’s despite her halfhearted “Hey I can do it-”s and “I got it I got it-”s. Shuddering as the brisk morning air nipped at my nose, we headed out through the tiny, dimly lit station and out to the narrow, cobblestoned street. It seemed the village was still asleep; there were no joggers, no noisy rush-hour traffic like there always was back in Jersey... no nothing. Silence lay like a blanket of fresh snow cloaking the entire village. I couldn’t decide if I found it peaceful or if it gave me the fucking creeps.  
Oh, and when I said village, I meant it. I wasn’t just using a cute word to describe the quaintness of the place. No, by law Nénuphar was legally regarded as a village because apparently its population didn’t make the cut to amount to a town. All I really cared about, though, was if they had a decent coffee joint.  
The houses lining the street were all very close together, and looked about as old as the French Revolution. They were made of stone, complimented by cute little flower troughs many had underneath their windows, boasting blooming tulips and daisies and roses and marigolds. Some had vines snaking up the side, creeping around dainty windows and glowing a lovely, verdant green. As I examined the charming village I couldn’t help but compare it to the washed out bleakness of the industrialistic buildings in New Jersey, the air perpetually heavy with humidity and boredom.  
But this was completely new to me. I mean, I’d seen pictures of my mom as a girl in her Catholic schoolgirl uniform in front of one of these buildings, but actually being there was something different entirely. It looked like the kind of place where parents would let their kids go on adventures outside in the city, exploring the winding streets and running wild in the hills, their only limitation being on time for supper. Meanwhile, I couldn’t go much past the end of the block without my mom having a fucking cow and reminding me of the floating dead bodies found frequently in the nearby river, or the most recent shooting in the next neighborhood over. She would bring me back inside, sit me in front of the TV, and play our city’s horrific news channel that always scared me shitless. Only then would I, being the rebellious lil kid I was, actually attempt to take interest in the indoor entertainment my mom so vivaciously recommended. Don’t get me wrong, my mom is a fucking saint, but...yeah, that was my childhood.  
All of a sudden I felt the weirdest stab of jealousy. The children who were raised here probably roamed all day in the grassy hills picking daisy chains and playing really dope games of hide and seek, what with the narrow alleyways in the village and all. Then again, Europe’s got all these weird fairy tales and superstitions, so parents probably didn’t let their kids out for fear of them getting snatched up by the fucking witch from Hansel and Gretel or whatever. Or was that a German tale? Fuck if I knew.  
It was only when I had stopped ogling the gorgeous, perfectly preserved archaicness of the little village that I realized my mom had stopped walking and leaned back on only a slightly precarious-looking sign that read, Station de Train de Nénuphar in an extremely old fashioned, excessively curly font. The sign matched the rest of the town with its hundred-year-old style, but it lacked the crude graffiti I so often saw and usually did not participate in back in Jersey. Despite how long the fucking thing had to have been there, I respected it for maintaining its historical value. The more I stared at it, the more it kinda looked like something from a Disney movie. Hell, the entire town was a dead ringer for the village from Beauty and the Beast. Not gonna lie… It was kinda cool. Not that I’d ever admit it.  
“Seymour is on his way. He’ll take us back to the house,” my mother’s words snapped me out of my sign-ogling daze. I noticed my jaw had gone slack and my mouth was hanging open with my concentration. Jesus Christ, I can be such space cadet sometimes.  
“See-who?” I asked dumbly, still a little upset about my abnormal level of spaciness today.  
“Sey-mour. Seymour Savatiér,” My mom’s French accent was so much more prominent than usual when she said his name. “He’s… he’s an old friend.”  
Just then, a little green Kia pulled around the corner, parked, and a tall, dark haired, very French-looking man stepped out and a booming, heavily accented voice rumbled, “Linda, mon chéri.”  
My mom smiled wide, embraced him, and whispered with misty eyes, “How long has it been?”  
“Eighteen years, I’m afraid. But you don’t look a day over the the age you left, Linda,” he grinned sweetly and my mom blushed. “And who is zis?” He gestured knowingly towards me.  
“Seymour, this is Frank, my son,” she squeezed my arm and smiled weakly.  
“Uh… bonjour,” I stuttered out my broken French and shook his outstretched hand.  
Seymour threw his head back, laughed heartily, and said, “Ah, Frank, it zis my pleasure. Eez it your first time in Nénuphar?”  
I nodded, eyes wide.  
“Ah, yes, well, I think you will find it filled with more secrets and adventure than it seems. You will never be bored!” With that he laughed his rumbling chuckle again, winked at my mom, and swiped our bags from my shoulder, stuffing them in his trunk and ushering us into the car.  
As we bumped over the rocky cobblestone underneath on the road to my grandfather’s house, my head hurt with the overwhelming kindness of the man. I thought French people were supposed to be rude and cold, not at all like the infectious kindness Seymour had met me with. That’s part of the reason why I told my mom that I’d only stay the summer here in France with her, testing out the European waters and hoping it didn’t spit me back out. My French wasn’t the best because my mom had only taught me the basics as a child; she apparently didn’t want me to have an accent and end up getting bullied in school. I mean, I still did, but not for that reason.  
She had promised, however, that if I tried it out and moved into my dead grandparents’ house in this small village in France with her, she would teach me the language and I would soon become fluent, surrounded by the town’s native tongue. I was open to the idea for a couple reasons: 1) My only friends back in Jersey were headed off to college, and making those were hard enough. Fuck my shyness. 2) My parent’s recent divorce had made my dad more bitter and irritable than ever, and spending my summer with him in the hardware shop he owned didn’t really sound like the fantastic summer experience seventeen-year-olds like me were supposed to experience. 3) My mom never really liked to talk about her childhood or her fascinating hometown, and I was curious. I had pieced her story together with the little bits of stories she did feel like sharing over the years: She was born and raised here in Nénuphar, France, the only child of the village’s pastor and wife of the 300 year old cathedral that graced the center of town. After finishing her schooling in the local ultra-Catholic, girls-only school, she had vacationed in Paris with some friends. There’s where she met my father, a stocky, green eyed Italian, and fell in love. What she hadn’t told me about and what I had come to assume came next: me. As soon as they discovered I had happened, they quickly eloped and immigrated to America to escape my grandparents’ outrage at my mom for marrying an Italian rather than a Frenchman, let alone having a child with one. That’s all that I knew. But I had never even been to France, and I wanted to at least visit the place. I was half French, after all. And finally: 4) I was secretly obsessed with French culture. Especially their romance movies. I was infatuated with the language and the ever-present sexual tension between the characters. I ate that shit up; it was my guilty pleasure.  
Despite all these reasons, I still had my anxieties about moving to a brand spankin’ new country, even if it was just for the summer. My number one fear was a local trying to strike up a conversation with me, thinking I was a native too. I would splutter and blush as they stood staring at me the way I had stared at my physics final exam. Then, apologizing profusely I would start backing away slowly only to trip over a fucking chair or spill my coffee or bonk a small child in the head with my elbow or something. Okay, maybe I exaggerated that hypothetical situation a bit, but seriously, I was shy and timid in the first place, and those thoughts haunted me every night for the weeks preceding our flight.  
As we bumped our way up a narrow street on a sloping hill (Nénuphar was full of them; it was kind of like a European San Francisco, except maybe add another 100 years of age to that) a colossal cathedral with gothic domed ceilings, pointed pillars, and decorated with intricate carvings and statues came into view to our left, a little beneath the hill we were scaling, surrounded thickly by the rest of town. It was the first European cathedral I had ever seen with my own eyes, and it made Assassin’s Creed Unity’s attempt to replicate it pale sadly in comparison. It matched the architecture and style of the rest of the village, but it was about triple the size of any of the buildings, and was obviously the main attraction with it’s exquisite stained glass, flying buttresses, and giant, angled arches. It was magnificent, to say the least.  
“That is St. Antoine’s cathedral,” my mom whispered over the front seat when she caught me staring. “My father was the head pastor,” she added quietly. Not that I didn’t already know. Finally, we came upon a huge stone house at the top of the hill, overlooking the rest of the village and the cathedral beneath it. It towered two stories tall and had light brown shutters with the village’s common vertical vines snuck up the sides. There was a lovely little garden in the front yard filled with a white flower I couldn’t name but smelled heavenly.  
Seymour pulled the car up on the cobblestoned lot. “Welcome home, Linda.”  
My mom’s face was painted with an expression of such ambivalence that I had no way to tell what she was thinking. I assumed that coming back to the house you were raised in that you left in such a rush 18 years ago and your last remaining parent that you hadn’t spoken to in years had just died in could give someone some mixed feelings, so I understood. I had never been here, let alone even met my grandparents, so instead my face was most likely painted with a mixture of awe, fascination, and maybe a little intimidation. Okay, probably a lot.  
Seymour helped us with our bags, but he really didn’t need to because they weren’t heavy; all they had was a change of clothes, some toiletries, our wallets, and our passports. Since we were moving overseas, we had packed my mom’s Toyota with the rest of our wardrobes and belongings to be shipped and arrive sometime within the next day. Even then, it wasn’t much, because all the furniture we could ever need was in this old mansion, my mom had told me.  
When we headed to the door, I wondered how we would get in. Then Seymour explained to my mom that her parents had given him an extra set of keys just in case this exact situation would happen and their daughter decided to come home. It broke my heart a little. But all I saw was the slightest hint of regret on my mom’s face before she unlocked the smooth light wood of the front door.  
The house was decorated just as anyone would probably imagine. The floors were wooden and dusty, while the furniture reflected the elaborate French style I had come to expect. To my right was what seemed like the living room, featuring an exquisite rug lying underneath a soft-looking couch and loveseat. The rising sun’s rays streamed through the open window and illuminated the dust particles floating in the air. To my left, a classic wooden staircase that looked only slightly precarious spiraled to the second story with a cozy little kitchen nestled beside it. Upstairs is where I assumed the bedrooms were, so after politely taking my and my mom’s bags from Seymour’s helpful hands, I braved the creakiness of the stairs and explored the second story with nothing but the sun’s rays to guide my way. The upper level was much more open, with more loveseats and coffee tables and elegant rugs. But this time, I noticed a shady corridor and was instantly drawn to it. I’d seen enough horror movies to have accelerated me through simple phases of increasing bravery at a young age. At this point, I was at the if-I-die-it-might-as-well-happen stage anyways.  
I set down the bags on a nearby coffee table and peeked my head around the frame of the unlit hallway, to find that it wasn’t really unlit at all. Weak streams of light reached for the ground from the arched windows of the slanted ceiling of what looked like a fucking library. Bookcases lined the walls of the enormous room and a heavy scent of old books and ink settled over me. There was even a fucking ladder to access the higher shelves. My God, this is place really is like Beauty and the Beast.  
“I see you’ve found my teenage hangout,” a voice appeared from behind me, causing me to let out a noise that sounded something like “huYEUH” and launch a dusty book I had picked up at my possible attacker.  
“Ah! Easy- Frank, who throws books? Seriously,” My mom muttered, disgruntled.  
“Don’t creep up on me! Creaky house, dark room, mysterious looking books, it all adds up Mom,” I widened my eyes at her.  
“Anyways, like I was saying, that is, before you tried to behead me with The Great Gatsby, back in my day, books were the only thing we had for entertainment. No phones, no computers, and only a couple good channels on the TV. Your generation should consider itself lucky.”  
And that was the moment when I thought I should have considered myself lucky that the fucking village I was to live in even had cell service.


	2. coffee

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay guys, I promise it gets 19393% more interesting in this chapter. thanks for reading, let me know if you like it and if I should write more! I wholeheartedly apologize for any grammar or spelling mistakes, I proofread this maybe once, oops.

Chapter Two

 

That night, and for the next few nights, I slept like a baby, weirdly enough. My mom assured me that the sheets in my new bed had been recently washed by the service that comes in and cleans after a loved one has passed away, whose relatives were nowhere near. It was surprisingly soft and felt like butter on my aching muscles, even though at that point I probably could’ve passed out on a sinking boat.  
I hadn’t even had time to inspect my new room with all the unpacking my mom and I had to do. The rest of our stuff was delivered and I had grown accustomed to my mom buzzing around the house, sighing when she saw I’d put something in the wrong place, (which happened often, to my offense) fidgeting with boxes, and re-bunning her hair. By the end of our 6th day in Nénuphar, most of our belongings had found their homes in the old stone house, moving boxes had begun to haunt my dreams, and I hadn’t even had left the house since our arrival. The only thing keeping me going was that we were almost out of those one-pot coffee packs and I’d been eyeing our stash dwindle, twitching as it neared nonexistence. This wasn’t all bad, however, because it seemed to accelerate my box-flattening abilities and by the seventh day, the house no longer looked like one of those you see on Hoarders, and I was ready to take on my coffee-locating mission.  
That morning, my mom had rushed out of the house at 6am sharp to resume my grandparents’ administrative duties at the cathedral. It was part of the reason we moved here and I can’t say I was surprised, she always ended up doing things she had sworn against, and she definitely had had some objections when her parents informed her as a teen that they expected her to uphold the holy family tradition. It didn’t end well then, but at least I was a result of her previous defiance. Even though she had eventually given in, I was happy for her. I saw how stressed out her boss at her old job had made her; maybe finally being the head of something would give her some ease.  
As for me, I looked everything but at ease when I looked in my new, elegant bathroom mirror for the first time in what felt like forever. Dark circles shadowed ominously underneath my hazel eyes and my cheeks looked hollow and pale. I turned the tap on and splashed what was, to my surprise, Antarctic-level-icy-hell-water directly onto my slightly still sleeping face. Used to the warm water that ran through our pipes almost year round in Jersey, this was nothing less than a rude awakening to me. I staggered back into the also icy surface of the bathroom wall and yelped when the bare back of my skin met with it before falling backwards onto my ass on the also icy tile of the floor. What a fucking morning already.  
Muttering obscenities under my breath, I shivered as I slicked the slightly damp black hair back from over my eyes. After admitting defeat to the bags under my eyes and the unexpected wintriness of my new bathroom, I threw up my hands and shuffled back into my room where I quickly dressed into black jeans, a "The Cure" shirt, and my lovingly tattered black converse. My mom had threatened to throw them out when the black had started to fade to a sickly green, but I had saved them from her evil clutches. They weren’t “disgusting” or “ridiculous” or “embarrassing” as she had rudely put it, they just had character.  
Making sure I had a decent amount of euros in my wallet, I promptly headed out the door, dreading the pounding headache that an unfed caffeine addiction threatened and prayed that this tiny village wouldn’t let me down. I scaled the hill in a manner that took probably twice as long as it would a normal human, cautiously recalling an embarrassing experience involving hiking, a steep hill, and a young, idiot me. When I’d made it to the village, I realized it was more awake than I had expected for 9:00 AM on a Monday morning in the middle of summer. The scent of fresh baked bread wafted seductively from various boulangeries’ open doors, and bakers bustled around while women with lacy parasols lounged on the metallic tables out front, sharing baguettes. Well dressed men walked their groomed dogs down the cobbled road, and two teenage girls in black sun hats sharing a croissant giggled and whispered to each other as they eyed me over their sunglasses while they walked by.  
Ignoring the numerous curious looks from locals I got while simply walking down the sidewalk, I kept my eyes peeled for some sort of like, food-mart or something, something that would have even the shittiest coffee grounds for the sad little pot I’d lugged overseas. To my dismay there didn’t seem to be anything like that around, on that street at least, and I knew if I ventured much further I’d get lost in the twists and turns of the village blocks. My sense of direction never was very impressive anyways, but throw me into a place completely new along with the added bonus of an almost completely foreign language, and I can guarantee you that’d be the last you would see of me.  
Just as I was about to admit defeat for the second time that day, my nose twitched as the heavenly scent of brewing coffee beans filled it and a small but crowded shop labeled with nothing but a sign of a steaming mug came into view.  
“Oh my fucking God,” I subconsciously whispered, making a beeline for the entrance. I didn’t care that it was filled with shamelessly curious locals, I just wanted some damn coffee. A bell jingled when I wrenched the door open and I was greeted warmly with a chorus of “bonjour”s and that familiar scent that made my mouth water. Stepping briskly into the annoyingly long line, I noticed from the corner of my eye a group of messy haired boys with twisting grins and husky, echoey laughs sitting around a small circular table in the corner of the packed shop, each sipping generously at their steaming mugs. At first I only eyed admiringly at their coffee, but then my eyes slowly glided over to one of them in particular. His raven hair fell boyishly over his hazel green eyes and his small mouth moved quickly, uttering something unintelligible, but apparently hilarious because the entire table promptly burst out in a fit of loud laughter. His lips curled into a beaming smile, flashing bright white, narrow teeth, and just as he did his eyes flitted swiftly from over his cup of coffee directly into mine, and proceeded to quirk an eyebrow and smirk right at me. Heart pounding, face flushing, I ripped my eyes away and realized I had been wholly and embarrassingly distracted to the point that I was next in line and I had no idea how long that had been the case.  
“Uh, une latte s'il vous p-plaît,” I stuttered the shitty French out as best as my flipping stomach and rushing blood could allow. I could feel the gaze of the boy burning into my back and stood stiffly as the barista fired back with a string of foreign words and an expectant expression, leaving me taken aback once again as I hadn’t expected her to say much more than “deux euros s'il vous plaît”. Oh fuck. Oh fuck. Oh fuck.  
“Um.. uh.. Pardon?” I stood there helplessly, struggling, wracking my brain for the right words for this fucking awful situation. “Uh-”  
Right at that moment, a smooth, creamy voice with a thick French accent but surprisingly impressive English rose not far from my right arm and made me jump almost three feet in me air.  
“She’s asking which size you would like,” when I turned, Green Eyes stood way closer than I had originally imagined, and I became hyper-aware of the warmth radiating from his arm that slightly grazed the hair that stood straight up on mine.  
“So? Which one?” He raised both eyebrows and widened his emerald eyes enough for me to clearly see the smudges of coal black that lined them. I also thought I saw the hint of an amused expression gracing his cherub-like features.  
“O-oh, um, large?” I continued to stare involuntarily into the stranger’s eyes with probably the dumbest, doe-eyed look on my face as he turned and spoke rapidly to the barista, lingering a little too long on the way his full lips formed each syllable. As I watched him, I wondered how he’d known I was shit at his language. He had to have been watching me, or maybe he just overheard the most embarrassing experience of my entire life. He got here so quickly too, and stood so close. I guessed that French people didn’t have the same societally accepted standards of personal space that Americans did.  
The pace that my heart was beating as Green Eyes stood by my side and ordered for me was already borderline ridiculous, but soon became unhealthy the second when his angelic face turned away from the barista to face me again, this time what he said taking me even more off guard:  
“If you don’t mind, may I ask your name?” He asked coolly, his expression calm and collected. I envied him for it. I couldn’t even begin to imagine the trainwreck of my probable facial expressions at that moment.  
“M...my name? Wh-”  
“The barista must know so she can call you for your coffee,” he gave me a polite yet knowing little half smile.  
“Oh, r-right, my name is Frank,” the words spilled out of me and I was left with the all too familiar sensation of heat crawling up my neck and cooking my face.  
“Ah, Frank,” he quickly turned to the barista and uttered a few more words that I was beginning to understand, as I wobbled on my feet at the way his accent altered my name. The _r_ was a harsher sound in French, but the way it sounded in Green Eyes’s mouth was much sweeter. “I hope I was of some help,” he turned one last time to me, eyes shining and mouth twitching with amusement as he followed me when I walked to wait for my coffee. I was grateful for his help, but resented the fact that he thought my struggle was comical. Okay, it probably was, but seriously, talk about a nightmare come true.  
“Oh, merci,” I stuttered out my thank you in French, hoping it would sound more genuine that way. Instead it just sounded like I had a bunch of marbles in my mouth.  
“So you must be the newcomer, l’Américain,” his mouth twisted into another smirk as his eyes shamelessly scanned me, top to bottom, causing another blush to settle hotly over my entire fucking body.  
“Wait- how would you even know that?” I demanded, genuinely confused.  
“How could I not? This is a small place Frank, word gets around, believe me,” his voice got low and husky towards the end of his sentence I realized how intently I had been staring at his eyes that never seemed to let mine breathe. His adamancy for eye contact was definitely a foreign concept for me, and it made me squirm as if I was under a heavy spotlight. I felt as if he could see straight through my eyes and into the back of my head, as if he could read my thoughts and discover all my secrets just by the way he looked at me.  
When I didn’t respond, mostly due to the deer-in-headlights syndrome I’d contracted from this calm yet inquisitive green-eyed stranger, he remained unfazed and only smirked harder.  
“However, Frank, I am worried for you,” he briefly broke our eye contact as he looked down at the coffee in his hand and coolly leaned his back against the glass of the pastry display, before snapping his eyes swiftly back to mine, his expression ridiculously calm, but still displayed the ever-present bit of amusement playing on the corners of his mouth.  
“You’re...what?” I had to remind myself that this was a complete stranger, he was just being polite, and that he could not read my mind.  
“Worried, Frank. You are from a big city as I take it, or at least somewhere bigger than this. You know only a bit of French and now live in a village that speaks French exclusively and probably has a population well under that of your former high school. It must be a bit of a culture shock, is it not?” He spoke so quickly I had to hang on to every word like it was a matter of life or death just to understand him, especially over the bubbly chatter of the seemingly popular coffee shop. But when he said my name for the fifth time in the past three minutes in that soft way of his, I heard him loud and clear.  
“Um… I guess. To be honest this is the first day that I’ve even gone into town, haven’t had time to start adjusting, I came straight here…” I couldn’t figure out what to say, or why I had just opened up like that to a complete stranger. I couldn’t figure out why he had taken an interest in me. Yeah, I’m a lame American that just wants a fucking coffee and I fucked up a little trying to get it, and yeah it was probably pretty funny to watch, but that’s no reason to stick around and try to ridicule me in a low-key, faking-friendly sort of way. I decided that’s the most likely scenario here, and that pissed me off.  
He threw back his raven head and laughed loudly, flashing those small, white teeth again. That pissed me off even more before he remarked between giggles,  
“The first thing you do after uprooting your entire life and shipping it overseas...is go out for a coffee?” He laughed some more before his expression quickly returned to his common look of calm collection and he muttered lowly just before taking a swig from his mug, “I think we’ll get along.”  
Just at that moment, I heard my name called sharply in a woman’s voice, snapping me out of this stranger’s unrelenting ability to dazzle me in the most embarrassing way. I turned on my heel and picked up my latte, thankful for whatever greater being sent me in the direction of this place. I sipped it immediately, burning my tongue horribly but forgetting to care because _damn that was some good fucking coffee._  
When I looked up from my cup, though, Green Eyes was gone, and after doing a 360 around the room, I saw him among the group of also messy-haired boys through the windows of the shop, pushing each other down the sidewalk. His mouth was stretched into a gleaming smile, and his eyes crinkled with the laughter of a joke unknown to me. But once again, right at that fucking moment, he did that thing where he somehow sensed my eyes on him and miraculously flitted his to meet my gaze in record time. However that time, there was no smirk. No, that time he fucking _winked_ at me. The only thing on my blank mind at that moment was how grateful I was that he was out of sight by the time my facial expression bloomed into the mixture of utter confusion, embarrassment, and dizziness that I was feeling.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chocolate croissants, wildflowers, and propositions. French Gerard and teenage Frank are back!

“Ew.”  
The echo of my mom’s disgust woke me, and I rolled over in bed, groaning, to glare at her through blurry eyes.  
“You couldn’t at least put these shoes in your closet? You have one for a reason,” she said, leaning on the inside of my bedroom door, making a face at the mess of my room. I squinted my eyes at her in response, then flopped onto my stomach and clutched a pillow over my head, face buried in the sheets. She sighed. “I’m off to work. We’re out of coffee again. I drank the last of it, sorry,” she said curtly, not sounding sorry at all. I groaned into my bed, loudly enough for my mom to hear me over the muffle of the pillow I grasped over my head. “Anyways,” she sang, pretending not to hear me, “adieu, mon chéri!”  
Once I was sure she was down the stairs and out the front door, I lifted the pillow, and rolled over flat on my back. I stared at the ceiling. My heart was beating faster than I would’ve liked to admit, and my breathing became quick. After I had gone to the coffee shop for the first time exactly a week and a half ago, I had not been back. My mom had come home from work that same day brandishing boxes of store-bought coffee, effectively eliminating any excuse I had to return to the shop. But now, we were out of coffee, and I didn’t know where she’d gone to get the store-bought boxes. I mean, she had told me, but it didn’t seem likely that I would be able to find the market without getting wholly and completely lost. So that left me with one option.  
It was time to muster up the fucking courage and go back to the coffee shop.  
It wasn’t that I was scared, per se, it was more a feeling of… intimidation. I told myself that as I dragged my body out of bed and showered with lightning speed. Looking into the mirror afterwards I realized that I had become paler than ever, thanks to my recent aversion to leaving the house. I had spent most of my time since I moved to the tiny village of Nenuphar lounging in the library and reading Frankenstein, my favorite novel, or exploring the ancient house I now called home. In this down time my mind had also replayed the entire scene from the coffee shop over and over, and with each replay, the memory grew more mortifying.  
I scrubbed at my face, trying to make it look as if I had more color in it than it did. The only true color in my face was the faint hint of purple and blue I had under my eyes, thanks to some recent sleepless nights. I threw on another black band t-shirt, not even bothering to look what it was, they all were basically the same, anyways. I ran my hands through the dark mass of hair that sat damp on my forehead, making sure my eyes were somewhat visible. Once I was positive that all the various shades of black of my outfit matched, I flew out the door and down the hill to the village, which was more awake than I was.  
Apparently, Saturday mornings were always busy in the village. People liked to eat out for breakfast and walk their dogs down the cobbled lanes. The dogs were my favorite part. They eased my anxiety in this foreign village, as usually all the owners let me pet them. On my trek to the coffee shop, I met a little yorkie named Sam, nestled in his owner’s Louis Vuitton bag, a fluffy shiba inu named Sushi, and a golden retriever puppy named Dewey. My spirits were high as I approached the shop, and my heart started to race a little bit, for whatever reason. I could see the hoards of people crowded into the shop even before I ducked in through the door.  
Once inside, I tried to stop my eyes from scanning every corner of the place. After ordering, though, I stood waiting, my foot tapping uncontrollably as I couldn’t help but flit my eyes over the inhabitants of the shop. My heart sank as I realized I found no messy heads of black hair, no brilliant green eyes or red smirking mouths. I mean, what was I expecting? I thought to myself, beating myself up silently for even exercising the thought that I would run into that stranger again, the one who somehow made my heart beat at a rate I didn’t know was possible, or healthy.  
“Frank!” My name shouted in a gruff French accent stirred me from my frustrated thoughts; I swiftly picked up my drink and made a quick exit from the shop, as its crowdedness now just irritated me.  
Whatever. It really didn’t matter to me whether I ran into him again or not. As I said this to myself I realized I didn’t even know the green eyed stranger’s name. This only made my curiosity about him burn stronger, making me even more upset. I didn’t want to think about him anymore.  
As I walked stormily down the street, I sipped at my hot coffee and tried to dodge all the teenage girls in big wicker sun hats and the older couples heading to breakfast.The only thing that was able to draw my eyes from the ground was an old shop with big glass windows boasting hoards of used books. For a moment my hand hesitated in mid-air, reaching for the door. Then I pushed my way in. I didn’t have anything better to do, and anyways, I had a soft spot for old books. It’s not like I was going to find a record shop anywhere around there, either.  
Walking in, the old bookstore offered a cool burst of air that made me realize just how hot it was outside. By that point, it was late June, and solace from the heavy summer sun was always welcome from me. The store was also much quieter than outside; I realized I didn’t detect anyone else even inside it with me. The scent of old books was everywhere as I strolled silently down narrow aisles and aisles of them, stuffed in every open corner. I started to examine them.  
Wait. Fuck. They were all in French.  
I don’t even know what I had been thinking. I guess for a moment I forgot that I had completely uprooted my normal teenage American life and shipped it totally overseas. Sighing, I continued scanning the titles of all different shapes and sizes of books before something caught my eye. I slid my fingers over the book; it looked newer than most of the other ones. Autobiography, by Morrissey. And it was in English!  
“Oh, fuck yeah,” I muttered under my breath, and began to crack it open when-  
“Ah, Morrissey, my favorite.”  
The suddenness of the arrival of the low voice behind me had extremely embarrassing effects; after jumping about three feet in the air, I was halfway through blindly launching the book I had in my hands at the stranger that had snuck up on me before a soft hand caught my wrist, and another caught the book that had gone flying.  
“Whoa! I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you,” I looked up at the low voice’s owner, and found myself face to face with the clearest green eyes, ringed with black liner.  
My breath was gone. I stood silent for a moment before noticing how completely unapologetic his features actually were, the corners of his mouth turned up in an amused smirk.  
“Yeah, you… you totally did,” I stuttered. I meant for that to sound about 150% meaner than it actually did. Instead I just sounded like a small child, eyes moon-sized as I stared at this beautiful fucking stranger.  
He laughed. “Okay, maybe a little bit. What would you have preferred, should I have coughed first?”  
“Maybe,” I murmured, eyes dropping to the floor as I felt red hot blood creep up my cheeks. I realized the stranger’s hand was still gripping my wrist, and it was warm and soft. Noticing how my eyes had flitted to his hand, he quickly released me, and for the first time I saw his perfect features break its ever-present expression of confident flawlessness.  
“Sorry,” he muttered, and the smirk was gone. In fact, his mouth turned the opposite way into a grimace. However, it wasn’t long before he composed himself and snickered,  
“So your chosen defense mechanism against unwanted surprises is... book-launching? Seems reasonable,” he held the book out in front of him, staring at me through thick black lashes.  
Now it was my turn to compose myself. I took the book back, met his intense eyes, and quipped in a steady voice, “And it’s your offensive tactic to sneak up on people?”  
His smirking mouth widened into a full-blown smile, flashing his little white teeth. “I guess it is. It works wonders, I can go very silent when I try,” he laughed. “I’m Gerard.”  
I barely heard what he had said, my head was swimming; His melodic laugh made me dizzy and caused my stomach to do little flips. I blinked a couple times, then a couple more times.  
“Gerard.”  
“And you are Frank,” he uttered, eyes once again scanning me, top to bottom, shamelessly.  
“That… that would be me,”  
“Great. Off we go,” Gerard spoke softly, but as he did he swiftly closed his long, slender fingers around my elbow and started down the aisle towards the door, dragging me behind him, the most dumbfounded expression plastered on my face.  
“Uh, what are you doing?” I sputtered, yet offering no physical objection to this turn of events as I stumbled over my own feet following this determined stranger out the door.  
“Kidnapping you,” Gerard snickered and pushed the bookstore door open with his free hand before smirking at me over his shoulder. “Just kidding. Your mother asked me to take you on a tour of the town.”  
Once outside, I tugged my elbow out of Gerard’s grasp and skidded to a stop on the cobbled sidewalk, my eyebrows furrowed. “Um, I’m pretty sure I can find my way around this place, thank you,” I could feel the hot blood of embarrassment creep up my cheeks as I pretended to be navigationally competent.  
How fucking embarrassing.  
Gerard’s kohl-smudged eyes widened. It seemed that he did not expect me to resist to his attempted kidnapping. People with little ice cream cones passed by, eyeing our commotion questioningly. Gerard kept looking at me, and I watched as his surprised expression changed. His slightly ajar mouth slowly turned up at the corners and he eyed me through his long black eyelashes.  
“Are you sure about that?”  
The simple question almost knocked me off my feet. The way he peered at me through his thick lashes, the little smirk that played at his mouth - it was too fucking much. He saw right through me.  
“Fuck. Okay fine, you’re right. Let’s go,” I confessed, my cheeks burning hotter than ever. I pushed past Gerard and started back down the path he was taking me in the hopes that he wouldn’t notice.  
I walked a couple feet before I got a little worried that Gerard wasn’t following me as I didn’t hear a thing. I was tempted to peep over my shoulder, but I decided that would take all the seriousness out of storming past him. Even if I had decided to, the semi-stranger suddenly appeared right next to me; it was if he floated over, he was so light and quick on his feet.  
“Jesus,” I muttered, “if we’re gonna spend time together you’re going to need to learn how to be human and stop sneaking up on me,” I turned my head to squint at him scorningly. He just smiled.  
“It’s not my fault that you’re jumpy,” Gerard turned and looked at me, eyes shining with pure glee in the sunlight. We continued on the cobbled sidewalk, passing others heading out for the day. He walked close to me, so close that occasionally his arm brushed against mine, making my breath hitch each time. I hid my face behind my coffee, only peering up from it to speak.  
“Where are we going, anyways?” I tried to maintain a hint of annoyance in my voice, but in all honesty I had no true objection to the venture. I really had nothing else to do. In fact, I had spent most of my days so far sitting at home, sipping coffee, and reading books I had read a thousand times already. It was about time I saw more of Nenuphar.  
“You look hungry,” Gerard replied simply, keeping his eyes fixed forward, and running a hand through his hair. “We are going to fix that first.”  
I opened my mouth to object but my stomach betrayed me and growled at that exact moment. Instead, I sheepishly whispered, “Okay.”  
We walked a little more down the street, turning at enough random corners that I became completely and thoroughly lost. It hit me that at that point I was entirely dependent on this person who was still practically a stranger to me.  
“Wait - you said my mom asked you to show me around? You know my mom?” The question suddenly became very important.  
“Yes. Kind of. She’s like, childhood friends with my mother or something,” Gerard replied. It looked like he wanted to say more, but at that moment we turned a final corner onto a slightly less busy street and Gerard’s hand closed around my wrist again, pulling me into what looked to be a bakery. This time I did not protest.  
The scent of freshly baked decadencies filled my nose immediately and I realized just how hungry I really was as my mouth filled with water. Gerard’s melodic voice was near my ear as I slid my eyes over the rows and trays of beautiful, flaky treats,  
“You like French pastries, don’t you, Frank?”  
“Hm? Oh, mm-hmm,” his breath ghosted over my shoulder, and the combination of the chills he gave me mixed with my immense hunger stunned me for a moment.  
Leaving me wobbling on my feet a little still near the door, Gerard loosened his grip on my wrist and walked to the counter, and began uttering in French to the cashier. I shook my head to free me of my daze, took a seat by a window, and peered around. The place was small and cute, and there were people filling the other chairs, sharing croissants and sipping espressos. There was a pair of girls in heart-shaped sunglasses staring shamelessly at Gerard’s back and giggling to each other, eyeing him the way middle school girls sneak looks at their crushes. I watched them watch him so closely that I didn’t even hear Gerard approach, once again.  
“Why are you scowling like that?” His green eyes narrowed and looked concerned, as he held a little pastry I couldn’t identify wrapped in papers in his hand. He followed my gaze to the giggling girls across the room, and when he turned back to look at me, I could see a fleeting expression of amusement flicker on his cherub-like features before he pulled me out of my chair.  
We pushed our way out of the pâtisserie and I followed Gerard down the road again. We walked silently, but the streets were fuller than they were before and I ended up bumping into multiple people and stumbling on my own feet. Fuck, I’m so damn clumsy, I thought.  
Soon enough, Gerard noticed my issues with the simple task of walking, and the amused smirk reappeared. I was half expecting him to make fun of me in that sly way of his, but instead he did something I wasn’t expecting. Slowly, he slid his slender fingers that were still grasping my pale wrist down my hand and ringed his pinky finger around mine, to lead me through the crowds. It was a simple gesture, but it was enough to send shivers up my spine and tinge my cheeks an embarrassing shade of pink.  
We walked like that for a couple more blocks. And even though I was completely lost, I couldn’t find that anxious feeling in the pit of my stomach that usually grew the more lost I became. For some reason, Gerard’s mere presence and his long pinky finger wrapped around mine had an ultra-calming effect on me; I felt safe.  
We reached the edges of town and the short, ancient buildings fell away to some truly beautiful surroundings; the rollings hills I could see from my bedroom window were now only feet away, covered in dense green grass and dotted with little yellow wildflowers. After blocks of silence, Gerard’s voice startled me.  
“La prairie,” he uttered just above a whisper, “my favorite part of Nenuphar.”  
The outdoor air was cool and fresh. The wildflowers smelled sweetly and fluttered softly in the light June breeze. Gerard watched as I took in the beautiful sight before he pulled me forward by our still-locked pinkies. We crossed a small, arched, cobblestone bridge over a babbling brook that cut through the meadow, the water flowing slowly. My mouth fell open at the sheer serenity of the place.  
Gerard kept pulling me until we arrived at a huge, old-looking oak tree that offered some shade from the warm sun. It was surrounded by the little yellow flowers I didn’t know the name of. Gerard suddenly broke our pinky chain and gracefully slid down the tree’s trunk to sit on the soft-looking ground of its base. He looked angelic; dressed in ripped black jeans and a simple black leather jacket, the wildflowers he sat among failed to compare. When he realized I hadn’t joined him, he glanced up at me through those long, thick lashes once again. The yellow from the flowers seemed to bring out lighter flecks of colors in his large green eyes, and I started to feel a little dizzy.  
“Frank, sit. I don’t want you fainting on me,” he did look genuinely concerned, but I caught that ever-present expression of quiet amusement that graced his features before he composed himself. I slid to the ground myself, my back to the trunk of the tree and my shoulder brushing Gerard’s. More shivers.  
Gerard shook his hair out his eyes and began unwrapping the pastry before handing it to me. I set down my coffee and peered at the gorgeous, golden thing.  
“Pain au chocolat,” Gerard whispered, his breath blowing sweet and minty over my face, as we were sitting shoulder to shoulder. The close proximity made my head spin, but I focused on the amazing aroma from the pastry to ground me. I tore it in half and put some in my mouth.  
Gerard watched me intently, eyes wide and hopeful. Delight bloomed on his features when he heard my audible reactions to the pastry.  
“Oh my- Oh my fuckinkgf gawhd,” I spoke through mouthfuls of decadent, warm, melting chocolate and buttery, flaky pastry.  
“Hahaha, I knew you’d like it,” he continued to watch me eat with an intensity that proved he had genuine interest in my reactions.  
Gerard stretched his legs out in front of him and placed his hands in his lap, sighing contentedly. I realized what a hoarder I was being as I continued to stuff the chocolatey goodness in my mouth. I tried to offer him the other half but he just smiled.  
“Eat it. Please. You’re going to need the energy,” his expression seemed to show that he knew something I didn’t yet, and he took joy in that. He seemed to like surprising me. But I shrugged the comment and his shady expression off. Even though I’d only known Gerard briefly, I got the sense that he always knew what was going on, always had a plan. I trusted him in that (or, decided not to care) and focused back on the amazing scenery around us.  
The babbling brook flowing a few feet in front of us pooled in a little pond near our tree. There were lily pads floating in the water, a picturesque scene straight out of a Monet painting.  
Gerard, in his all-knowing manner, followed my gaze once again and whispered, “Nénuphars.”  
His breath on my cheek shook me. “Hmm?” I looked up at him, and I realized our faces were only inches away.  
“Those-” he gestured towards the lilypads. “I don’t know the word in English. Those are nénuphars. Our town’s namesake.”  
“Lilypads,” I whispered, a small smirk appearing on my face this time.  
“Lily-pads.” Gerard sounded out the English word, not breaking our eye contact. Even when speaking a word he’s never spoken before, his voice comes out all low and graceful and melodic. Fuck.  
“Yes,” I choked out, struggling under the warm intensity of his gaze.  
“So,” he spoke softly, watching his own movements as he raised a hand to my face, his thumb slowly tracing the corner of my mouth, and to my horror, coming away with a dab of chocolate. “Are you ready for our adventures?”  
“Adventures?” I gulped, watching as he looked down and licked the bit of chocolate from the tip of his thumb, thick lashes brushing his cheeks.  
“Frank, it’s summer. You’re young, you are in France, and there is much to do. Your mother has tasked me with keeping you out of the house, and showing you everything there is to see. And as I have nothing much better to do either, I don’t see why I shouldn’t,” his words flowed fluidly and a half smile graced his lips.  
His eyes flicked back up from his thumb to meet mine. He faltered slightly.  
“Unless...unless you don’t want to,” his voice lowered to a husky whisper, dropping his eyes to the ground.  
It was funny to see him falter like that. It was such a change from the perfectly composed, always confident persona he constantly exhibited. It made me smile a bit, knowing I wasn’t always the insecure one.  
I poked him in the cheek, and stuck out my tongue.  
“Oh, shut up. You know I’m not gonna say no. I do have one condition, though,”  
He looked up at me, a puzzled yet amused expression showing through his green eyes.  
“And what would that be?”  
“We get one of these again, tomorrow,” I pointed to the chocolatey pastry wrappers, my face serious as stone.  
Gerard burst into laughter, and his black-lined eyes crinkled up. He wrapped his pinky around mine once again, looked at me straight in the eyes, and whispered,  
“Deal.”


End file.
